Conservative Party Conference: Immigration Proposals

The Conservative Party Conference took place this week in Birmingham, where the party gathered to debate on policies and to hear their leaders speak. As expected there was much discussion on immigration and proposals to reduce this. This can be summarised as follows:

Home Secretary Amber Rudd:

• Forcing businesses to disclose what percentage of their workforce is non-British as a way to encourage businesses to hire more local British nationals;
• Making the current Resident Labour Market Test, used when employing non-EEA nationals under the Tier 2 work scheme, tougher, by businesses having to demonstrate what they have done to “foster a pool of local candidates” and also to show what impact choosing an overseas candidate would have on the local labour market;
• Reducing the number of foreign students;
• Introducing a new £140million migration impact fund to alleviate pressure on public services;
• Landlords who rent to illegal immigrants could be sentenced to up to five years imprisonment;
• Taxi drivers will have mandatory immigration checks;
• It will be made easier to deport EU criminals;
• EU nationals that repeatedly commit minor crimes will be deported.

At present these are proposals and are subject to consultation. We will continue to keep you updated.